Blessed (Advent Reflections)
It's been a while since I've sat down in this tiny space in the middle of the internet and shared my thoughts. The last few months have been full of grieving, loving, learning and growing. I'm currently in the middle of a social media detox, and while its giving me tons of new inspiration and energy, I also realized i miss connecting with friends online. So I'm turning to my old blog to share some thoughts I have on this advent season.
I've shared before how I love advent. I've moved away from a lot of christian traditions but advent and lent are still 2 traditional church observations that i adore. I didn't do anything for lent this year (Or maybe I did? The grief fog was so real I'm missing huge chunks of memory from around the time Paris was born) and I almost skipped over advent without giving it a second thought. The first Sunday of advent i was exhausted and didn't make it to church and, when Cody came home and told me they lit the first advent candle, I consoled myself with the thought that there's always next year. Until I stumbled upon a Youtube video by one of my dear friends, Morgan Day Cecil, and she was talking about something called Best Advent Ever. I was intrigued (Morgan is the one who inspired me to take a social media detox, and besides being an amazing woman she's also my feminine wholeness coach and doing hypnotherapy with her has been one of my main healing tools since losing Paris. I would read her grocery lists. If you haven't checked her out yet, do yourself a favor and look her up) and so I did a quick google search, which led me to Vibrant Catholic and their best advent ever series.
Here I am, the little nerdy girl in the corner who went to Bible school and lived in the evangelical church world forever, and I found myself subscribing to these daily video reflections on advent. Here's the part where I'm going to sound really naive, but as I was watching the first video I found myself thinking "these people aren't old, or weird, or crazy!" My experience with Catholicism stopped at nuns, the Pope and this one ash Wednesday service i went to once where i felt completely out of place and didn't know when to kneel or sit or stand and didn't understand half of the words that were being said. This is not a post about my conversion to Catholicism, but I am saying that the past few months have opened my eyes to different ways of relating to God, and I'm not afraid of being too out there anymore, where i would have been once.
In today's advent reflection video, Morgan read the beatitudes. Verses I've heard a million times, because growing up as a church kid that's just what happens. And yet I found myself holding my breath as she read them.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted
Can we just read that again for a minute? Can we sit in it, marinate in it? Blessed are those who mourn.
It felt like a tiny spark came and hit me. I wasn't excluded from this advent experience because of my grief. I was blessed for it. It wasn't something to be pushed aside and kept until another year when I could better prepare my heart and mind for the birth of Christ, which is Christmas. It was now. The word that became flesh was for this very moment. Christ came for the messiness, the brokenness, the grief. And because of this I am blessed.
Shortly after Paris died, I remember sitting in bed alone, crying and begging God, the Universe, whoever was listening at that point to help me understand why this had happened. Why, when we had given up on the dream of ever having biological children, did God give us a child only to take him away? I felt like I was in this in between space of being a mother but not having a child in my arms.
And I remember then, distinctly hearing the voice of God. She was as near to me as my own breath. And she said "I gave up my son too. He died too."
Later that day, a friend messaged me a quote that said "The liminal space is the womb of the Divine Feminine."
Give me a minute to catch my breath. My motherhood journey, my breaking open, my greatest pain, brought me here. To the womb space of Divine Feminine. Motherhood to motherhood. breaking to understand the greatest breaking in all of history.
So this advent season, I'm taking moments to savor, to go slow, to go back over the stories that just became second nature to me and looking at them with new eyes. I'm giving myself permission to feel, to grieve, to be where i am and not feel the pressure to be anywhere else. I am present. I am not letting the season pass me by, because this season is for the lost and grieving waiting with anticipation for new hope. I am blessed because of my grief, not disqualified because of it. Each grieving breath brings me closer to the heart of God.
Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted
Blessed are the meek for they will inherit the earth
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be filled
Blessed are the merciful for they will be shown mercy
Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
Matthew 1:3-10
I've shared before how I love advent. I've moved away from a lot of christian traditions but advent and lent are still 2 traditional church observations that i adore. I didn't do anything for lent this year (Or maybe I did? The grief fog was so real I'm missing huge chunks of memory from around the time Paris was born) and I almost skipped over advent without giving it a second thought. The first Sunday of advent i was exhausted and didn't make it to church and, when Cody came home and told me they lit the first advent candle, I consoled myself with the thought that there's always next year. Until I stumbled upon a Youtube video by one of my dear friends, Morgan Day Cecil, and she was talking about something called Best Advent Ever. I was intrigued (Morgan is the one who inspired me to take a social media detox, and besides being an amazing woman she's also my feminine wholeness coach and doing hypnotherapy with her has been one of my main healing tools since losing Paris. I would read her grocery lists. If you haven't checked her out yet, do yourself a favor and look her up) and so I did a quick google search, which led me to Vibrant Catholic and their best advent ever series.
Here I am, the little nerdy girl in the corner who went to Bible school and lived in the evangelical church world forever, and I found myself subscribing to these daily video reflections on advent. Here's the part where I'm going to sound really naive, but as I was watching the first video I found myself thinking "these people aren't old, or weird, or crazy!" My experience with Catholicism stopped at nuns, the Pope and this one ash Wednesday service i went to once where i felt completely out of place and didn't know when to kneel or sit or stand and didn't understand half of the words that were being said. This is not a post about my conversion to Catholicism, but I am saying that the past few months have opened my eyes to different ways of relating to God, and I'm not afraid of being too out there anymore, where i would have been once.
In today's advent reflection video, Morgan read the beatitudes. Verses I've heard a million times, because growing up as a church kid that's just what happens. And yet I found myself holding my breath as she read them.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted
Can we just read that again for a minute? Can we sit in it, marinate in it? Blessed are those who mourn.
It felt like a tiny spark came and hit me. I wasn't excluded from this advent experience because of my grief. I was blessed for it. It wasn't something to be pushed aside and kept until another year when I could better prepare my heart and mind for the birth of Christ, which is Christmas. It was now. The word that became flesh was for this very moment. Christ came for the messiness, the brokenness, the grief. And because of this I am blessed.
Shortly after Paris died, I remember sitting in bed alone, crying and begging God, the Universe, whoever was listening at that point to help me understand why this had happened. Why, when we had given up on the dream of ever having biological children, did God give us a child only to take him away? I felt like I was in this in between space of being a mother but not having a child in my arms.
And I remember then, distinctly hearing the voice of God. She was as near to me as my own breath. And she said "I gave up my son too. He died too."
Later that day, a friend messaged me a quote that said "The liminal space is the womb of the Divine Feminine."
Give me a minute to catch my breath. My motherhood journey, my breaking open, my greatest pain, brought me here. To the womb space of Divine Feminine. Motherhood to motherhood. breaking to understand the greatest breaking in all of history.
So this advent season, I'm taking moments to savor, to go slow, to go back over the stories that just became second nature to me and looking at them with new eyes. I'm giving myself permission to feel, to grieve, to be where i am and not feel the pressure to be anywhere else. I am present. I am not letting the season pass me by, because this season is for the lost and grieving waiting with anticipation for new hope. I am blessed because of my grief, not disqualified because of it. Each grieving breath brings me closer to the heart of God.
Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted
Blessed are the meek for they will inherit the earth
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be filled
Blessed are the merciful for they will be shown mercy
Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
Matthew 1:3-10
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